Absolute Fact / Universal Truth

[Adavardes]

Please, stop with the existential, off-topic comments.

 

They're perfectly on-topic. I believe the topic is Absolute Fact/Universal Truth. That's what I was talking about, whether you like my philosophy or not. Since you just declared that you hate philosophy. Or was that real? I don't absolutely know.

 

You exist. Absolute Fact, even if you are a computer program.

I exist. Absolute Fact, but thats harder to prove as you are not seeing me right now.

We both need oxygen to live. Absolute fact.

You posted a message on Lucas Forums. Absolute fact.

 

So you know for an absolute fact that I really exist? That you really exist? That we both are breathing right now? That this forum exists? You know that, without a shadow of a doubt, and without a shadow of a doubt, you cannot be wrong? You are an omnipotent, omniscient being, that can say anything, and know, absolutely, for a fact, with complete and total objectivity, that what you see, and what you know, are actually real.

 

Ha. I doubt it.

[Det. Bart Lasiter]

i am a bot beep boop bop

[True_Avery]

Meh, I'm done.

 

By definition, there is now nothing to do with this topic.

[Achilles]

I hate philosophy.

FWIW, I don't think very much of what's being posited here qualifies as "philosophy". Philosophy tends to be rooted in logic and well...

[Adavardes]

Meh, I'm done.

 

By definition, there is now nothing to do with this topic.

 

So, instead of admitting that you can be wrong, that it is very possible that your concept could be incorrect, as I have conceded about my own several times, you're going to dismiss the entire debate. Instead of admitting that because you could be wrong, and that my concept could hold water, that reality may be questionable, and that because of imagination, things can be both real and unreal, you are going to end the argument.

 

What if air doesn't exist, and we only die when we fail to breath because our brain has been programmed as children with pre-concieved concepts built into our very genetics that tell us to breath, or we die, and the brain shuts down in a powerful psycho-somatic fit of failure to comply with a suggestion so old, it's become part of our genetic instinct. Well, we know air exists, right? We can measure it, and see it. But what if we can only do that because someone suggested to us that it's what really exists? That we have bent our perspectives to see something that isn't there. With imagination, a child can see a person that isn't there. Why can't we see air, even when it doesn't exist? (Seeing is being used as a rather large term, by the way)

 

Not saying it does. Not saying it doesn't. Just saying, it could be either. And as a person that is not right all the time, it's safe to say that you can concede that you could be wrong, and not know it. That knowing if you are absolutely right or wrong cannot be done, due to the fact that we don't know if something is real or unreal. I'm willing to accept that your theory holds water, and take it seriously. You want to know why you should take mine seriously? Because you can be just as wrong as I can.

 

FWIW, I don't think very much of what's being posited here qualifies as "philosophy". Philosophy tends to be rooted in logic and well...

 

Yup, because your definition of logical cannot be wrong, and I'm just a rambling lunatic. No amount of derogatory statements are going to change the fact that I have formed this theory, if you want to call it that, with a firm basis in "logic".

 

If you can be wrong, and you can make mistakes, then logically, you could be wrong about your side in this debate. Inversely, so can I. Maybe I'm full of ****. Okay, I can deal with that. Can you deal with not being able to absolutely know that you are absolutely right? To know that, you can never be wrong about anything, ever. Are you?

 

Love how you revert to name calling, by the way.

[Achilles]

What if air doesn't exist, and we only die when we fail to breath because our brain has been programmed as children with pre-concieved concepts built into our very genetics that tell us to breath, or we die, and the brain shuts down in a powerful psycho-somatic fit of failure to comply with a suggestion so old, it's become part of our genetic instinct.

This seems like a very easily testable hypothesis. Why don't you put your money where your mouth is and get back to us when you have something more than "what ifs" to throw at us? TTFN.

 

Yup, because your definition of logical cannot be wrong, and I'm just a rambling lunatic.

QFT

 

No amount of derogatory statements are going to change the fact that I have formed this theory, if you want to call it that, with a firm basis in "logic".

Err, technically it would be a hypothesis and so far you don't even meet the minimum qualifications for that.

 

If you can be wrong, and you can make mistakes, then logically, you could be wrong about your side in this debate. Inversely, so can I. Maybe I'm full of ****. Okay, I can deal with that. Can you deal with not being able to absolutely know that you are absolutely right? To know that, you can never be wrong about anything, ever. Are you?

It's not about me being right. It's about whether your ideas have merit or not. That has absolutely nothing to do with me whatsoever.

 

Love how you revert to name calling, by the way.

[Adavardes]

This seems like a very easily testable hypothesis. Why don't you put your money where your mouth is and get back to us when you have something more than "what ifs" to throw at us? TTFN.

 

All you're doing, if I'm at all right in this, is throwing around "what ifs" and calling them more than that. I actually don't think it's possible to do what you're asking me to do, which would kind of lead us to a logical crossroads. I can't prove to you that I have any merit to your qualifications, and you can't prove to me that you know absolute facts. Having the ability to be wrong and all.

 

Err, technically it would be a hypothesis and so far you don't even meet the minimum qualifications for that.

 

That's philosophy, mate. Funny thing about it is that even Empiricism is a philosophy. Just one way of doing things, created and shaped by a man. Descartes, wasn't it?

 

It's not about me being right. It's about whether your ideas have merit or not. That has absolutely nothing to do with me whatsoever.

 

You're applying your concepts of logic, which you cannot know are right or wrong if my concept holds water (NOT SAYING IT DOES), to try and prove whether something I'm saying has "merit". Okay.

 

EDIT: Let me just paint a picture here, so that maybe this makes more sense. I know that if I were to claim that nothing is true, then my argument can't be true, and if my argument can't be true, then something has to be true. That's a paradox. I know that, I logically recognise that. Which is why, during the course of this debate, I have instead suggested that things can be both true and untrue, but we don't have the capability to recognise which is which, because we can create that which is not real, mistake it for real, and be wrong.

 

I'm presenting my argument as something that could undoubtedly be very, very wrong. I am speculating. That's all we ever do. Speculate. But you're not willing to concede that. You're saying that speculation isn't what we're doing. You're laying down the facts, and I'm a rambling lunatic. What makes you more right than me, if evidence could be imaginative constructs, if you could be wrong, if you could be mistaking what is real for what is not? You probably can't. Maybe. So we speculate.

[Achilles]

All you're doing, if I'm at all right in this, is throwing around "what ifs" and calling them more than that. I actually don't think it's possible to do what you're asking me to do, which would kind of lead us to a logical crossroads. I can't prove to you that I have any merit to your qualifications, and you can't prove to me that you know absolute facts. Having the ability to be wrong and all.

 

That's philosophy, mate. Funny thing about it is that even Empiricism is a philosophy. Just one way of doing things, created and shaped by a man. Descartes, wasn't it?

 

You're applying your concepts of logic, which you cannot know are right or wrong if my concept holds water (NOT SAYING IT DOES), to try and prove whether something I'm saying has "merit". Okay.

Sophism

[True_Avery]

You miss the very point of your own argument.

 

So, instead of admitting that you can be wrong, that it is very possible that your concept could be incorrect, as I have conceded about my own several times, you're going to dismiss the entire debate.

I cannot admit I am wrong, and I cannot call myself right, because both right and wrong are human constructs.

 

There is no such thing as incorrect, because incorrect and correct are flawed due to being part of human language trying to decribe a universe that cannot be proven, or disproven to exist.

 

But proven and disprove are human constructs, so...

 

Do you get it? I could point out the flaws for infinity, but infinity does not exist as time is a flawed human concept.

 

I am walking away from the debate because...

 

There is nothing to debate, because there is nothing. But, that statement is flawed, because there cannot be nothing, as nothing is a human concept.

 

Instead of admitting that because you could be wrong, and that my concept could hold water, that reality may be questionable, and that because of imagination, things can be both real and unreal, you are going to end the argument.

I cannot be wrong, because there is no such thing as wrong.

 

There is no such thing as no such thing.

 

None of it can be proven, or disproven.

 

Your argument cannot hold water, because a human typed it out. It cannot hold water, because water is a human construct, and the saying "cannot hold water" does and does not exist, etc etc etc etc.

 

I end it, because there is no beginning. Neither end nor beginning exist, as time is a human construct within flawed subjective human language.

 

Not saying it does. Not saying it doesn't. Just saying, it could be either.

Either or, or either. Either does not exist. Neither does does, or doesn't.

 

But you cannot prove that they do or don't.

 

There is no logical, or human way to present this. At all. But at the same time...

 

And as a person that is not right all the time, it's safe to say that you can concede that you could be wrong, and not know it. That knowing if you are absolutely right or wrong cannot be done, due to the fact that we don't know if something is real or unreal. I'm willing to accept that your theory holds water, and take it seriously. You want to know why you should take mine seriously? Because you can be just as wrong as I can.

Stop calling me right or wrong and undermining your own argument.

 

I am not stupid. If you had bothered to read, I explained earlier that I was a full supporter of moral relativism for a long time.

 

I know this branch of philosophy, if it can be called that. You by basis of your own argument, you and I can neither be right nor wrong about it as right and wrong may or may not exist, but may or may not may or may not exist.

 

I walk away because there is nothing to debate, by definition of the argument.

 

The most logical thing I can do is walk away from something that is, by definition, impossible to defeat.

 

I will never admit that you are right, because by doing so I am claiming an absolute. I will never I am wrong to this argument, because there is no way to claim either, as both are subjective human constructs.

 

Stop sitting on top of your high horse. You cannot claim victory over a debate that cannot be debated, and can neither be right nor wrong, seeing as neither exist, or not exist.

 

It comes down to a theory called Solipsism, and some forms of Nihilism, which I am familiar with and understand the concept of, and can articulate it just as well as you can.

 

Stop being so arrogant.

 

The End.

[Adavardes]

Sophism

 

Human concept.

 

I cannot admit I am wrong, and I cannot call myself right, because both right and wrong are human constructs.

 

There is no such thing as incorrect, because incorrect and correct are flawed due to being part of human language trying to decribe a universe that cannot be proven, or disproven to exist.

 

But proven and disprove are human constructs, so...

 

Do you get it? I could point out the flaws for infinity, but infinity does not exist as time is a flawed human concept.

 

I am walking away from the debate because...

 

There is nothing to debate, because there is nothing. But, that statement is flawed, because there cannot be nothing, as nothing is a human concept.

 

Maybe. But this is why we speculate. Create concepts. We're trying to find the absolutes. But maybe we never can. Maybe it's too far beyond us. If it is, we'll never know, will we?

 

Thank you for, at the very least, respecting the possibilities. I'm sorry if I came off as arrogant. I never meant to be so, and you have my sincerest apologies. Maybe you're right. Maybe I'm right. Who knows? I look at this as an intellectual stimulus, an opportunity to question things, and wonder "why is something that way, why does it mean this, why does that always mean that?" Fun, really. I'm not trying to be mean or arrogant, or call your entire life into question out of spite or hatred. Just trying to get you to ask the question, "why?"

[mimartin]

FWIW, I don't think very much of what's being posited here qualifies as "philosophy". Philosophy tends to be rooted in logic and well...

QFT, but after college philosophy, I still agree with True_Avery

I hate philosophy.

[Achilles]

Human concept.

So is the concept that everything is nothing more than a human concept. Ignore your own rules at the risk of your credibility.

 

QFT, but after college philosophy, I still agree with True_Avery

I had to take quite a bit for both my grad and undergrad degrees too but luckily it never soured me to anything more than sloppy thinking.

[True_Avery]

Thank you for, at the very least, respecting the possibilities. I'm sorry if I came off as arrogant. I never meant to be so, and you have my sincerest apologies. Maybe you're right. Maybe I'm right. Who knows? I look at this as an intellectual stimulus, an opportunity to question things, and wonder "why is something that way, why does it mean this, why does that always mean that?" Fun, really. I'm not trying to be mean or arrogant, or call your entire life into question out of spite or hatred. Just trying to get you to ask the question, "why?"

Ok, then I apologize for snapping at you.

 

Its just, I'd expand upon the debate if there was anything to debate about. Being that I'm a Nihilist for the most part, I get where you are coming from and understand it enough to articulate it, but due to my own human flaws have a hard time comprehending it fully. And, well, by definition it is seemingly impossible to comprehend.

 

So, for the sake of my own sanity and not further spamming the thread with drivel, I'm respectfully backing out of the topic as I feel its gone as far as it can go.

 

Good day to you, good sir.

[Adavardes]

So is the concept that everything is nothing more than a human concept. Ignore your own rules at the risk of your credibility.

 

Achilles, are you completely ignoring what I'm saying? It's a human concept, and human concepts have the same possibility of being right or wrong. Wrong and right are human concepts, so they could be wrong. I say that human concepts are human concepts, but that concept could be wrong. You say that my concept of human concepts being human concepts is wrong, but you could be wrong. One of us, or all of us, could also be right.

 

This is a war that cannot be won with "You lose your credibility", or "You don't follow logic". Logic and credibility could be incorrect concepts. They could also be right. So, we do as we have always do, and speculate as to what we're doing, trusting in the fact that we are right. Like T_A said:

 

The most logical thing I can do is walk away from something that is, by definition, impossible to defeat.

 

I have had fun, though. It's kind of frustrating to come to an end where you can invariably go no further without coming to shaky ground, and I can understand why you want to keep claiming that my argument holds no water, or eats itself. Truth is, I don't care, because eating itself may be wrong, or holding no water may be wrong.

 

I can't prove myself right, you can't prove me wrong. Diffusion of responsibility on the person claiming something, IE, certain debate etiquette, could also be wrong, or right. I think I've said all that can be said, and this debate has met its invariable dead end.

[Achilles]

Achilles, are you completely ignoring what I'm saying?

Not at all. How could I possibly find the flaws in your arguments without actually reading them?

 

It's a human concept, and human concepts have the same possibility of being right or wrong.

No, not the same possibility. Please go back and re-read post #45.

 

Wrong and right are human concepts, so they could be wrong.

Depends on the context. True or false is not the same as good or evil. One is a means of comparison for something observable (and therefore outside this "human concept" mumbo jumbo). The other is a human construct (so far as I'm willing to argue). They are not equal, just as any other context you wish to provide for the nebulous terms you used above.

 

I say that human concepts are human concepts, but that concept could be wrong.

Including yours. *Poof* your argument disappears. We're all prepared to move along. How about you?

 

You say that my concept of human concepts being human concepts is wrong, but you could be wrong. One of us, or all of us, could also be right.

 

This is a war that cannot be won with "You lose your credibility", or "You don't follow logic". Logic and credibility could be incorrect concepts. They could also be right.

Sophism

[Adavardes]

No, not the same possibility. Please go back and re-read post #45.

 

Depends on the context. True or false is not the same as good or evil. One is a means of comparison for something observable (and therefore outside this "human concept" mumbo jumbo). The other is a human construct (so far as I'm willing to argue). They are not equal, just as any other context you wish to provide for the nebulous terms you used above.

 

Including yours. *Poof* your argument disappears. We're all prepared to move along. How about you?

 

Sophism

 

1. Mate, I already answered that.

 

EDIT: Let me just paint a picture here, so that maybe this makes more sense. I know that if I were to claim that nothing is true, then my argument can't be true, and if my argument can't be true, then something has to be true. That's a paradox. I know that, I logically recognise that. Which is why, during the course of this debate, I have instead suggested that things can be both true and untrue, but we don't have the capability to recognise which is which, because we can create that which is not real, mistake it for real, and be wrong.

 

2. So you're absolutely right about your observations? See point 1.

 

3. I was willing to end the debate on the basis that our arguments could all go *poof*, or they cannot. Trying to say otherwise would be a concept, that can be wrong, or can be right, if what I'm saying is right, which it could be wrong.

 

4. Failing to see what defining the concept I have already admitted could be wrong or right does for your argument.

 

My friend, we have reached an impass which you cannot further disreputate my argument without running the risk that I am right and you are wrong, and I cannot further prove my argument as right without running the risk of also being wrong. Again, I admire the tenacity, but I think you'll find that you're going to keep circling around the same point that can't be proven over and over, because, as T_A said:

Its just, I'd expand upon the debate if there was anything to debate about. Being that I'm a Nihilist for the most part, I get where you are coming from and understand it enough to articulate it, but due to my own human flaws have a hard time comprehending it fully. And, well, by definition it is seemingly impossible to comprehend.

[Achilles]

My friend, we have reached an impass which you cannot further disreputate my argument...

At no point has that been my job.

 

Burden of proof

 

...without running the risk that I am right and you are wrong...

I have no stake in your claims, therefore there is no risk to me.

 

...and I cannot further prove my argument as right without running the risk of also being wrong.

Gee, that didn't sound like such a horrible thing when you were asking us to consider that we were the ones that didn't get it. I guess that shoe only fits on one foot?

[Adavardes]

At no point has that been my job.

 

Burden of proof

 

Diffusion of responsibility on the person claiming something, IE, certain debate etiquette, could also be wrong, or right.

 

Burden of proof = debate etiquette.

[Achilles]

Burden of proof = debate etiquette.

Sophism

 

And with that, I'm finished. The last word is yours lest some resurrects the discussion with something worth discussing.

[Jae Onasi]

Student: How do I know I exist?

Professor: And whom shall I say is asking?

 

Saying 'all things are subjective' is an absolute.... We may work within a set human construct, but it's based on what we as most humans can normally experience, see, feel, measure, and so forth in a generally similar way (severe mental illness excluded, since the brain chemistry/anatomy/physiology prevents normal perception). The wavelength of green light is a fact. Whether we as humans can see it correctly or not is a perception issue, but it doesn't change the light's wavelength. Some things are true regardless of our human limits and subjectivity.

[vanir]

Um...definitely not wanting to get in the middle of this argument, but have an inkling where it might have, in small part come from (or why it's being held onto with such determination).

 

Adavardes, schizophrenia is the misinterpretation of normal social stimuli by an incorrectly adapted brain chemistry (typically for deeply rooted emotional reasons such as child sexual abuse). People with schizophrenia might hear voices and they're not making it up, their mind is attaching memory associations to everyday stimuli in an unnatural fashion (sounding just like a disembodied voice they can hear through their ears just like the real thing). Hence the victims are generally paranoid, since they're extremely distressed by their strict medical illness, to say the least.

As an example, you were sexually abused by a man with dark coloured glasses and a gruff voice whilst heavy metal was playing in the background. Years later you move next door to someone who quietly plays heavy metal (most of the time you can't hear it and it doesn't bother you), but after several months you begin seeing faces at the window, a man with dark coloured glasses. Frightened, knowing there is nobody there you flee to the bathroom and lock yourself in, but hear a gruff voice yelling abuse at you from outside. Only you can hear it.

Get the picture?

 

The first strategy is learning to tell yourself to let reality go. Nothing's real, so that way you can say, even though you know this is real, since nothing is real it doesn't matter. It's not real just because you say it isn't, even if those things are still happening all the time real as daylight. You learn to ignore them with your hand over your ears and your eyes closed saying the mantra, "not real, not real, not real..."

 

But it doesn't work. You go loopey like that.

 

What works in the end is fully understanding what is happening to you. What your mind is doing to you in spite of yourself. And it is as simple as the medical explanations you've been getting all along (because trust me 99% of all schizophrenics immediately seek help). Most of the trick is in fact finding a doctor you get along with well enough that they explain in the way which best suits you, someone who has a bit of empathy for you.

 

 

Now I'm not saying that any of this relates to you at all Adavardes. Quite the contrary. I think somewhere in your subconscious you've been levelling this genuine modern social concern through the arguments you've presented here. They seem structured such a way. Quite admirable actually.

 

But as has been mentioned more or less by some and others, good scientific process is the key. When reality becomes questionable, personally or professionally, strict scientific protocols clear it all up nicely.

 

Facts can be absolutely true. Not always, but they can be

[Samuel Dravis]

Interestingly, if someone really did take solipsism to its logical end, they'd be much more like a hard realist than the odd skeptical doubter. Adavardes' continual attachment to the metaphysical-objective here is the only thing that allows him to doubt as he does, yet that seems strangely contradictory to his claim that our ideas are "human constructs." Why make such an exception?

[Achilles]

Facts can be absolutely true. Not always, but they can be

Perhaps I could better understand the argument if you could provide an example of a time where a fact was false. Not an example where we misunderstood a fact and had to revise our model after further observation, but where a fact was something other than a fact.

 

Thanks in advance.

[Yar-El]

Perhaps I could better understand the argument if you could provide an example of a time where a fact was false. Not an example where we misunderstood a fact and had to revise our model after further observation, but where a fact was something other than a fact.

 

Thanks in advance.

Ah. Your argument is based on exceptions.

 

Whole civilizations believed these were absolute facts -

 

(1) World is flat.

(2) Universe revolved around the Earth.

(3) Greek Gods.

(4) Salem Witch Trials. Methodologies for detecting witches.

(5) Earth is hollow.

(6) King Tut is an actual god.

(7) Sun is the only harbanger of gravity in our solar system.

(8) The universe is slowing down.

(9) Life can't exist without conditions similar to our own.

(10) Gods control the weather.

(11) There is nothing beyond Pluto.

(12) Large sea monsters will swallow whole fleets of ships.

(13) Earth's center has a sun.

(14) Large civilizations exist near the Earth's core.

(15) The Atom is the smallest mollecule.

(16) Etc...

 

Modern day human facts are not absolute.

[Achilles]

Ah. Your argument is based on exceptions.

And your rebuttal is based on a lack of understanding the difference between a fact and a model.

 

All of your examples are models of understanding. None of them are facts.

 

"That bird is black" is a fact. "All birds are black" is a model which can be altered by the introduction of new facts, such as the observation of a bird which is not black.

 

So again, can someone please provide an example of a time where a fact was not a fact.